


Dark Blood under the Moonlight

by Sparcina



Series: Hannigram Melodies [5]
Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Claiming sex, Episode: s03e13 The Wrath of the Lamb, First Kiss, Fix-It, Healing, Licking wounds, M/M, Many aspects of claiming sex, Murder Husbands implied, Possessive Hannibal, Post-Episode: s03e13 The Wrath of the Lamb, Post-Season/Series 03, Season 3 Finale, Unresolved Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-12
Updated: 2015-09-12
Packaged: 2018-04-17 19:03:16
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,857
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4677797
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sparcina/pseuds/Sparcina
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They fall, only to rise higher, intertwined for good.</p><p>Many thanks to AprilSummer for the Chinese translation!</p>
            </blockquote>





	Dark Blood under the Moonlight

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into 中文 available: [血色如墨](https://archiveofourown.org/works/4694855) by [AprilSummer](https://archiveofourown.org/users/AprilSummer/pseuds/AprilSummer)



They fell.

The wind was hard and cold, a slap that still managed to surprise him. His mind had extended to let him sense every inch of skin touched by blood, darkened by it. He was more aware of everything than he had ever been, and most importantly…

He knew where Hannibal was, and he felt him. They were intertwined in such an intimate dance of bloody limbs that he found it impossible to say where his body began, and where it ended. Hannibal's warmth mingled with his own fever, too hot for the wind to truly freeze him. Pain didn't register. Panic wasn't close to crush him, or even burgeoning to existence. The stolen life of the Red Dragon ran parallel to Hannibal's blood on his arms, chest and neck. It fell dark and rich on his cheeks, upside down, coating his own blood and tears. His heart was hammering in elation. 

When they dove into the wide mouth of the sea, Hannibal's arms had tightened around him. A wave of pain rode through Will, but it lasted only a second. Rapidly his priority switched from thinking to seeing, but for the longest time all he could see was water as dark as blood under the moonlight. He was falling, falling, deeper and deeper towards the abyss stretching under his feet... 

The arms around his torso pressed painfully under his ribs. Bubbles of protest left his mouth in a rush. He wanted to tell Hannibal to swim to the surface, to let him and save himself. Both of them had been seriously injured, and if one could reach the bank to safety, it would already be a miracle. Didn't Hannibal know this? Didn’t Hannibal want this?

But Hannibal didn't let go. In spite of the knife wound in his belly, he sank his nails into Will's shoulders and dragged him upwards, inch by inch, far away from the inviting black below. 

They broke the surface under a heavy rain. There was water everywhere around them, thunder to be heard, and Will had trouble making out the cliff in the night hegemony. Every wave looked like a sharp rock to him, and the water tasted like blood.

"Will!" 

Hannibal's pull was weak but determined. Will tried to help him along and swim in the right direction, but the endorphins seemed to have already left his body, for an arrow of pain suddenly uncoiled in his belly and exploded. It ran all the way up from his left foot. 

"I... can't!" he tried to shout, but his voice came out as a whisper. "My leg's broken. Go. Go!"

The words hurt, more than his broken leg. He didn't want him to leave, not after what had just transpired between them—the admission, the touch, the relief—but what choice did he have if Hannibal was to live? The waters were treacherous and chilling, and they were losing so much blood...

He couldn't discern Hannibal's face in the storm, but the pull on his shoulder strengthened.

"Come, Will!" 

Hannibal's voice was thunder and lightning. It electrified Will, gave him the necessary energy to fight the common embrace of liquid and oblivion on his way to the shore. It must have been no more than ten meters, but it felt so far...

"Will!"

His name was an order, and he complied. His fingers brushed rock. Two of his fingernails broke as he tried to keep from sinking. 

A shadow rose on his left: Hannibal was lifting himself up on the bank. Each of his movements seemed slow and uncertain, distorted under the raging sky. Will tried to grab some piece of rock and hang on to it, but it was covered in moss and pushed him away.

His head disappeared under the water…

… and then he was nowhere and everywhere at once.

_Will!_

His body felt disconnected from his brain. A thought hovered near his conscience, flashing pictures of white smiles, dark faces and red wounds to the void he had become.

_Will!_

Faces blinked in quick succession behind his eyelids. A young woman, full of hope as she stood on ashes, proudly showing the woods protuberating from her head. Abigail, the daughter he never really had, a borrowed dream. A shattered tea cup.

Then it was Jack’s face, macabre and too honest after Bella's death and Hannibal's escape.

Hannibal. Where was he?

_Will, wake up!_

His face hurt, especially to the right side. His left leg throbbed. The rest of his body amounted to a pile of bad and worst pains. 

_Will!_

Was it Alana who called to him? Hadn't she fled to safety with her family? No, it couldn’t be her. The Red Dragon? No… He was dead, because Will had killed him, with Hannibal.

Where was Hannibal?!

_Will!_

Warmth touched his lips. It lit them ablaze and burnt him awake.

Maroon eyes. They locked on his, the brightest pair of stars he had ever laid eyes upon. Steady pressure forced his chest to expand, and then his heart was started again. His lungs suddenly inflated, and another shade of warmth, much disagreeable this one, rushed up his throat. 

Hannibal held his shoulders as he threw up salty water. His hands were not commanding this time; they were comfort, strong but soft as they caressed his back and nape, welcoming him back from the underworld.

“I only ever wished for your happiness.”

Will felt his throat tighten. “I know,” he said, leaning back into Hannibal’s embrace.

Gently, almost reverently, Hannibal cupped his chin and lifted his mouth to his.

The warmth, the good one, surged back. In spite of the pain and the cold and all the questions that remained, Will moaned in the kiss. It felt so good to throw all pretenses and just be who he was meant to be. Sucking on his lower lip was a man who understood him, darting his tongue around his was his other half, his darker side, kissing him thoroughly was Hannibal Lecter, a killer just like himself.

That was what it had been about, wasn’t it, to make both of them jump from the cliff? Denial and acceptance, love and hate and confusion? And still he returned Hannibal’s kiss and reached for his back, tentatively at first, and then with clear urgency.

The rain hadn’t ceased, but somehow Hannibal found the tears amidst the rain drops on his face. His thumb brushed the fresh wound on his cheek. He didn’t lick it. Not yet.

"I may have to carry you,” he said, sounding out of breath and in pain, but so genuinely  _happy_ Will had to smile. "But I will fix your leg very soon."

"Yes, we will fix it."  _The teacup._

Hannibal was a doctor, Will an empath, and they were both predators. They would survive under the moonlight, covered in the dark blood of their shed human skins. 

* * *

 

Now that all masks had fallen, things were so much easier.

Will brought the glass of red wine to his lips and drank greedily. He spent a moment enjoying the aroma, the taste, all mingled up in his dazzled mind, the high pitch of the fruity and nutty undertones as delectable as the sweet splash of burgundy on his tongue. This synesthesia of senses affected him like a narcotic, but it couldn’t be the morphine Hannibal had given him to fix his broken leg, because this drug was long gone from his system.

Then how to explain that giddiness he felt, what about that fever warring against undiluted serenity? Could it be the sole result of the lull after the storm? 

The aftermath of falling into realization… That had to be the reason why he was, too, so ridiculously _happy_. 

A half-blissful, half-melancholic smile played on Will’s lips. He put the glass down and felt a rush of heat shot down his spine. As he brushed his slightly bruised lips, both by the fall and Hannibal's kissing—no, claiming—the fever spiked to lustful anticipation. 

Last week, everything had changed. Last week, Hannibal and he had killed a man together and almost died for it. Last week... Will drank a little more of the sweet red wine, feeling very much like if he was drinking blood under that dimmed light. The waves had been blood, and now it was his drink. He lived in a red world, and for some reason that was called Hannibal, he had come to terms with it.

He finished to drink his wine as he considered how totally bursting with emotions he had been on that night, during that storm, primed to kill both of them and save their lives in the same insane gesture. What made him choose life, choose _here_ , was Hannibal's answer to his own destructing questioning.

Hannibal hadn't fought him; he had done the opposite, embracing the act and shielding his body with his own as they hit the treacherous crests of the stormy waves. 

Hence here he was, sitting as a dining table for two, restless with too much nervous energy. His eyes swept once again over the shining cutlery, sharp and silver like bones, and the porcelain plates awaiting meat. Shades of blue intertwined with darker brown on the walls and furniture, a palette that reminded Will of his metamorphosis in the water by the cliff. He held no doubt that the choice of hotel had been conscious on Hannibal's part. 

Hannibal... The man had left early in the morning, silent as a shadow in spite of his recent ordeal. Will had only heard him because he had been awake, as he had been most night since the fall.

How could he sleep, when his whole life had changed so drastically? He had no wife now, no son, no job, only an incarnate, crimson dream that made him feel more alive, more himself, that any life path he had ever pursued before.

The room was still. It was the first time in six days that Hannibal had left for so long. Upon their arrival at the hotel, the other man had dismissed his own wounds to take care of him. He had washed the blood. He had stitched him up, fixed his leg, cooked for him. Every day since had been a variation of this tender routine, and not once Hannibal had touched him any more than strictly necessary. There were moments when Will had caught a glimpse of hunger in the maroon eyes, hunger that didn’t have to do with meat, but that was the end of it. 

Wasn’t what they had enough? And was that silent longing really the extent of Hannibal’s interest in him? Will squirmed in his chair, troubled by how easily his body responded to thoughts of Hannibal’s lust. 

“You have made my life a mystery and a joy through pain,” Will reflected aloud, eyes locked on the single drop of wine remaining in his crystal glass.

He sighed, brushing at his hurt leg unconsciously. He could have been lounging by the window, overlooking the splendid view it offered of Rio de Janeiro, but instead he sat at the dinning table, waiting. Aching.

 _Do you ache for him?_  

“Yes,” he whispered for himself. “I do.”

"Will?"

Hannibal entered the room, the satisfied expression of the victorious etched on his face. Will stood to welcome him, and after what Hannibal had done for them, this mark of respect was truly natural.

“How are you feeling?” Hannibal asked, rounding the table to join him.

“How are _you_ feeling?”

The maroon eyes sparkled. “I am happy you waited for me.”

Will swallowed hard. “I was… not hungry yet.”

He shivered when Hannibal raised a hand to his cheek, tracing the faint scar of the knife wound given by the Red Dragon. Disapproval replaced satisfaction, and Will tuned in his empathy to understand the shift. He found himself amused in a dark way that was becoming increasingly familiar.

“You are disappointed you didn’t give me that mark, aren’t you?”

The pressure on the wound increased. Will stilled, waiting. He had been waiting so long to know who he was and where he went that he could wait a few minutes more.

But Hannibal didn’t keep him waiting; he brushed his lips, lightly, then took his hand and pulled.

He was out of the water, Will remembered, heart hammering. Now he faced only metaphorical drowning.

The room in which he was led, Hannibal’s room, offered a thematic continuity with the rest of the suite: brown and blue on the walls and ceiling, sky sheets, ocean canopy, wood vases and curtains. For a moment, the thought of woods reminded Will that Abigail was dead and never coming back, but then Hannibal closed the door, and Will’s mind was back to the other predator in the room.   

“I can almost taste your thoughts,” Hannibal crooned, leaning over him, stealing his space and encountering no resistance. “They are so delicious, washed of doubts.”

“We have almost died for this understanding.” Will’s voice was low, not a plea, but not a confrontation either. It was the answer of an equal.

“Indeed.” Hannibal’s eyes shined. He bent his head over his, so slowly…

“This is no disfiguration to you,” Will whispered, voice trembling.

“No,” Hannibal agreed.

Will sagged as wetness trailed down the wound, then up. When those knowing lips replaced a tongue, his hips bucked in Hannibal’s hands.

“I’ve dreamt of this day for so long.” Hannibal’s body was flush against his. “And I’ve waited enough.”

This kiss was sensual and commanding, a perfection of this first touch of lips on the rocks. Will’s weakened leg spasmed under him.

Strong hands dropped to his ass, holding him up. They lit him straight away. Will spent a moment imagining burnt marks settling on the sensitive skin, replacing the bruises slowly yellowing. Hannibal was his fire, his addictive.

Then he felt the wall in his back. Hannibal’s form lined up with his body. It took all of one swift motion to bring their chests and groins flush together.

They were the same temperature, the same heart, and the same mind. Will couldn’t help it as Hannibal deepened the kiss at once, his tongue mapping the inside of this mouth, stroking his own, feeding on every moan gifted by his throat: he swayed and hardened.

Hannibal picked him up so fast that Will’s first reflex was to wind his arms around his neck. Before he could be sent into oblivion with another thorough kiss, he tried to speak.

“Hannibal, what are you doing?”

“You shouldn’t overexert your leg,” the other man replied matter-of-factly as he crossed the room to the bed.

Will didn’t remember how he could have ever been cold in the sea by the cliff, surrounded by Hannibal’s warmth. The heat in his loins was spreading to his whole body at a stupefying speed. He had to make a conscious effort not to bring his hand to his cock and do something about it.

Or touch Hannibal’s. The mere thought inflamed his mind, in a way encephalitis never had. His heart accelerated, sending the remnants of reason in the depths of his mind, way past his concern for his leg, which was already dimming in favor of closer contact with the man who had kept his touch so light and sparse over the last few days. During years.

Hannibal trailed a hand down his right forearm. He was kneeling in front of him, no, over him, in the lethal stance of the predator convincing his equal to surrender.

Except that Will had already done that, and more. He had gone to the other side of the world and would tear its foundations apart, if it pleased the only man who had ever looked at him like that, with such understanding and hunger.

“I am pleased you are capable of waiting.” Hannibal’s voice was rough, the words barbwire to the violence he didn’t dare inject into his touch.

Will shuddered in wonder. How he wanted that carefully crafted strength to blow out of proportions and be directed towards him in all its painful beauty, plain for him to feel… He trusted Hannibal more than the man trusted himself.

“The teacup is fixing up nicely,” he said, the words blunt and splashed with the desire he couldn’t hide.

He saw Hannibal’s pupils grow over the sanguine maroon irises, liquid with responding lust, and so potent that he felt his whole body tighten. Yearning swelled in his belly. Tremors of impatience coursed under his skin, especially under that strap of arm that Hannibal hadn’t stopped caressing. If this man had only ever wished for his happiness, Will had never felt so compelled as he did right now.

Compelled to be own. To be claimed. To be imprinted on and fit into a greater order of things.

“I believe you have healed enough to resist me if you so wished,” Hannibal crooned, tilting his head to lay kiss down Will’s cheeks and throat in lascivious succession.

“What about you?” Will asked in return, a tad breathless. “You need time to heal, too.”

“But I could never resist you, William.”

Will’s pulse had sped at once to those words. He couldn’t tear his eyes from Hannibal’s pupils, which had dilated further, blackening the irises until only a faint colored circle remained

“I didn’t take for granted that you were sexual,” Will blurted out before he could censure himself. But Hannibal would not want that, would he? “At first, I believed you used it only as a tool against obstacles.”

“Your doubts were the sweetest obstacles to overcome. May I?”

Hannibal had one hand on the hem of his shirt, the other surrounding the first and last button of the garment. Will didn’t trust himself to speak, so he nodded. It didn’t take time for Hannibal to expose his heaving chest.

“You are so impatient and lustful, and yet clearly afraid of what is to come,” Hannibal whispered as he inhaled his skin over his heart. His lips brushed a nipple, hardening it instantly.

Will’s arousal deflated. He wanted Hannibal, in his head, in his heart and in his ass, as deep as he could get him, but this new part of their relationship came with the usual hitches, like all firsts. 

“Hannibal…”A small moment of shyness amongst his darker and assured qualities, after the fall and the rise. “Don’t you want to eat first?” he asked with feigned interest.

“I know you’ve never done this before,” Hannibal whispered back in his ear, his accent thick, and it was not only his accent, apparently, and _fuck_ , Will swelled back to full hardness at once. Hannibal was so _ready_ against him.

“I want to take you, Will.” The man had one hand fisted at the front of Will’s pants, hovering over the bulge straining the fabric. “Ask me.”

“Please.” It was the only word Will’s mind could assemble. “Please do it.”

Soon enough they were both naked, two waves of pure lust crashing against each other in their sky and sea bed. They were the two halves of this Earth they had designed, from and for them only. Hands sought arms, nails scraped backs, legs slid against legs as their cocks rubbed against each other. Will’s moans kept getting louder.

Hannibal took a hold of his own cock, already leaking with precum. Will eyed it with a mixture of hunger and apprehension, then he couldn’t anymore, for Hannibal’s face was now on a level with his trembling tights.

He knew what was to come, but it didn’t make it any less pleasurable. The smooth feel of that mouth around him, everywhere… He knew he wouldn’t last long if Hannibal kept sucking him like that, kneeling on the floor with Will’s legs over his shoulders. His balls were already tightening, and now Hannibal was licking _them_ , and then the sensitive skin behind, and… and…

“Hannibal!”

The other man had penetrated him with his tongue, along with a digit. It was too much and it was not enough, and Will had to sink his nails into his own palms not to press on Hannibal’s face to feel this tongue _deeper…_

An aroused grunt left Hannibal’s chest. The man hummed as he dipped his tongue farther into Will’s ass, hands bruising his cheeks. His finger was doing incredible things to the parts his tongue didn’t own. The obscene noises of sucking and licking overwhelmed Will. Nobody had ever done that to him before, and nobody else ever would.

“Mark me,” he panted, delirious with the sensations created. “Take me.”

Hannibal’s free hand flew to his cheek, where the Red Dragon had marked him.

“You will be mine,” he growled. He was disheveled and panting, eyes unfocused and lips parted. He was so beautiful when undone. 

“Yes.”

“You will kill with me.”

 _For me_ was left unsaid, but Will heard it nonetheless.

“You’ve always wanted to expand my mind.”

With a last lick to his lush hole, Hannibal rose. His length begged to be touched, but Hannibal slapped Will’s hand away and positioned his knees on the edge of the bed. Will fought the reflex to hang on to the bedpost as Hannibal lifted his legs again, this time higher. He lined up his throbbing cock with the ass he had so carefully prepared and inched the tip in.

Will caught his breath; the other man took his time easing himself in his ass, turning the intrusion into gentle penetration. Every time he felt like Hannibal couldn’t surprise him anymore, he did.

After a few seconds only, Will found himself arching his back and moaning wantonly on the blue sheets. Every thrust was a nudge to his prostate. He tried to block the wet sounds of their fleshes connecting, so arousing, but in the end he did what Hannibal wanted him to do: he came, fast and so _hard_ that he lost sight for a second, everything in the room bleached to soft angles.

His hurt leg spasmed once, twice, then stilled. It was glorious to be spellbound in that bed, covered in bite marks and bruises. Will sighed in bliss as Hannibal cleaned them up before settling next to him with an arm across his torso. A thumb brushed the mark on his cheek.

The foreign mark. Will smiled secretly. This was Hannibal pure and raw, freed of the person suit that had never been tailored for his dreams.

“We wouldn’t be here had you fought me on that cliff,” he said, closing his hand on Hannibal’s one over his cheek. “Be content.”

“I can only be glad of my faith in you, Will,” Hannibal replied, using his other hand to trace Will’s lips and cradle his face.

They kissed again, without the previous urgency. Will let Hannibal lead, and it was not a bad feeling at all.

Part of him missed this woman he had called his wife, this boy who used to be his son, Alana, Jack and his dogs, but each minute spent entangled with Hannibal in this brave new world forged him other.

He was Hannibal’s. Finally, himself. 


End file.
